Unbound

“First Form!” Darius commanded. “Owl!”

Felix rushed forward, hooked blade leading the way. The movements of First Form, also known as Owl Form, were inspired by the quiet and observant nature of that bird. They emphasized slow, deliberate strikes and precise footwork.

It was a sadistic choice for the obstacle course ahead.

Blades as long as spears swung for him, rotating on sigil-driven gears and pulleys that moved with the speed of an oncoming train. Felix stepped forward, lunging as a horizontal edge sliced just below his armpit. He twisted, pushing another foot carefully into place as more swung for his neck. The whisper of cold metal slid across his skin but left no mark. For a man with Felix’s Agility, the course should be child’s play; no matter how fast the gears spun, they would not have caught even his shadow. Yet had he moved at full speed, it would have defeated the purpose of attempting it at all.

“To fight with a sword is to converse in the language of violence,” Darius said. He was visible just outside the twisting maze. “Each engagement is a dialogue. Your footwork and your sword are your words. You must choose them carefully.”

He kept moving. Step after careful step, repeating the pattern he’d hewn into his memory.

The footwork wasn’t a problem—his Body responded to his thoughts almost before he had them—so it was simply timing. Waiting for the right moment to strike.

With a final precise lunge, Felix cleared the whirling blades. He stepped onto a wide platform, a thin staging area right before the next section. He took a steadying breath and checked the stone disc at his waist. It pulsed in time with the suppression array he had laid below the course before starting, and a dull pain tore at his Mind, Body, and Spirit.

Darius scoffed. “Hesitation, Felix? I thought you had mastered the course and your suppression array?”

“You know your enemies will not grant you such grace. Onward! Second Form! Falcon!”

Felix stepped into the next section, which was a forest of thin metal wires that hung from above. The moment he entered, however, an array activated and drove Mana up and through the complicated machinery. Each wire, anchored upon a pivoting socket, began to oscillate at greater and greater speeds.

Razor sharp whips. Felix dodged the first few as they sped up. Always fun.

He dove into the fray, sword flashing out in rapid parries and pinpoint strikes as his feet blurred. A falcon was a fierce predator imbued with great speed and accuracy, and the Form emphasized rapid footwork and lightning-fast strikes. The razor whips flailed in almost random directions, devoid of any true pattern save chaos itself. Falcon was suited for its challenge, and Felix had to loosen his own restrictions on his Agility and Dexterity in order to match it. His crooked sword never stopped moving, deflecting every lash while slipping across the flexible wires to prevent getting entangled. Whips sliced and stung at him, cutting his Garment but never once touching his skin as he zipped through their wild embrace.

He was through it all in the span of fifteen seconds, exiting with a blast of trailing wind onto a fifty-foot diameter platform carved with relatively basic sigaldry. Felix knew it well: a warding circle, meant to keep Skills within the boundaries of the platform.

“Some conversations are short and brutal,” Darius said, and Felix heard him throw a lever somewhere just out of sight. Hatches opened all around the edges of the platform, and a ratcheting sound resolved itself into twenty different plinths that rose through the hatches. Upon them were Golems made of translucent glass and shimmering bands of red-gold orichalcum. Each bore a long spear of metal. “Some are more drawn out. You must know which one you are engaging in, and choose the Form that suits it.”

As one, the Superior Glass Golems activated. The sigaldry through their translucent bodies lit up with gold and silver, flooding their limbs with a simulacra of life, and propelling them toward him.

“Third Form! Eagle!”

Felix flowed into the Form, Inheritor’s Will sweeping outward to deflect three spears at once, and for the first time he was forced to unsheathe his Skyslain’s Riposte as well. The dagger leaped to his hand with a burst of blue-white lightning, and it lengthened mid-swing, taking out the legs of two more Golems.

Same as on Earth, the eagle was known for its keen eyesight and powerful talons. The Third Form emphasized strong, sweeping movements and powerful strikes. It was a Form to take on multiple opponents at once, but it required a great deal of Endurance and Strength to properly display.

The Superior Glass Golems moved with a fluid grace that far surpassed their lesser brethren, and their own strikes were enough to blast holes in the reinforced flooring as Felix dodged them. Felix had fought them several times now and was always surprised at how good they moved for what were basically magic robots. They were armored too, far more heavily than others, owing to the excess of orichalcum on their frames. Damaging them was a tall order for most, and Felix was still pulling his punches.

Well, mostly.

He caught spears within the hook of his sword, spinning them into one another before hitting their feet with his Riposte. The Golems toppled, bodies and weapons crashing against the metal platform like a gong, and Felix kept moving. He didn’t crush their chests or shatter their limbs. The point of this section of the course was to prove his technique with Third Form, not to destroy the expensive robots. That alone was a challenge. Felix was used to going all out in every fight, so these bouts were about control over fury.

Eagle’s sweeping movements were truly ideal for so many foes. He took them down, again and again. He avoided preternaturally fast thrusts and slashes, parrying to open up their guards before knocking their weapons from their hands entirely. The moment he did that, the Golems stuttered to a stop, as if he’d pulled their plug.

“One whole minute.”Felix came to a stop in the center of the platform, panting. “That was harder this time.”

“Harder? You—you vanquished twenty Superior Glass Golems!” A familiar Gnome climbed up onto the platform, staring at the downed and frozen Golems. It was Yorun, and he was trailed by two other Gnomes in similar Makewright garb. Other members of his Arclight Legion moved in the background, fiddling with bits of sigaldry. “They responded better than anything I’ve ever controlled, and you didn’t stop for a second.”

“I believe he means that it was harder to control himself,” Darius interjected smoothly. He landed atop the platform in a flurry of wind, his half-cape fluttering behind him. “Breaking something is one thing, but mastering them is another entirely. Thank you, Yorun, for helping us run the course. You can imagine how difficult it is finding someone with the right Skills out here.”

Yorun tugged at his ear and cleared his throat. “Well. My pleasure. Happy to help the Autarch anyway I can.”

“You did a good job,” Felix said with a smile.

Darius hustled all the mages off the course shortly after that, while the Golems were reactivated and put back down into the holding area just below the training platforms. Felix disengaged the suppression array. Glimmering lines of sigaldry faded away and a weight lifted from his Aspects as the stone disc at his hip darkened. It always felt good, like scratching an itch he’d been ignoring for an hour. As useful as the training was proving, it wasn’t pleasant.

They were in the depths of his Stronghold now, in a wide chamber dedicated to this sort of thing, though the course had been installed separately. The entire training facility, as Felix referred to it, was an unused room in his mountain fastness—too big for personal use and too private for just anyone to have access. Even getting the mages down there to run the course was a hassle, considering they had to pass through the multiple checkpoints from the Temple far above.

Karys took security pretty seriously.

Thankfully, the training course was easier to run for folks with less demanding needs. His friends, many of whom had rooms just down the hall, often made use of it. The settings were variable, able to accommodate their advancement to an extent by swapping out a few materials, even a set of lesser Golems. The Golems—including the Superior Glass Golems—were a surprise gift from Cal, something she called “a meager thanks” for his efforts to defend them. Rory had said as much when he’d offered to stay on and teach the Legionnaires, bringing the training courses with him.

Felix truly appreciated it—while the others found challenge against Steel and standard Glass Golems, he did not. The Superior version was still ultimately weaker than Felix, but at least they made him sweat so long as he suppressed his Aspects, regeneration, and held back his raw stats. Control over brute strength; it was a test of his patience, but he felt more confident than ever with his Sword Forms.

Plus his friends had a really hard time fighting them, and that had been fun to watch.

Now they were more prone to using the expansive sparring ring Felix had built. He’d modeled it after the one in a warehouse in Haarwatch, where he’d first been trained, shaping its boundary walls out of rock and filling the interior with a thick coating of sand.

It was this that Darius angled his head toward, as the mages filed out of the room. “Let us test your Sword Forms, Felix. I sense improvement in you, but I find a spar speaks volumes.”

At his waist, Felix’s sword buzzed. “My Lord? The Nagafolk have assembled.”

“Oh good,” Felix said. “Tell them I’ll be there in a minute.”

“Very good, my Lord.” The sword dimmed.

“Seeing them off first, followed by your own departure?” Darius asked.

“Yeah. You sure you don’t want to lead them? It’s an important task.”

“With you taking Commander Kastos with you, I’ll be needed here. Your armies have grown substantially, and if we plan to be ready for the dangers the Hierocracy poses then we have a great deal to do.”

“That’s fair. Thank you, by the way,” Felix said. “For everything.”

“As Lady Dayne is committed to your cause, I could not in good conscience leave your people as…ragtag as they were. Discipling and technique is my bread and butter, and that is what I have imparted. It may hurt my pride a bit, but you are the reason they have progressed so much, Felix. Without your influence and example, your Legion would still remain bickering factions…or worse, farmers and laborers.”

“Not really sure that’s worse, dude.”

“You know what I mean.”

Felix grinned. “I do. You’re saying I’m the greatest boss you’ve ever had.”

Darius snorted. “You are certainly the strangest. I hope you intend to keep practicing during your journey.”

“I plan on it. I’ll have Harn there, and he’s promised to put me through my paces,” Felix said. “Vess and Evie too.”

“Commander Kastos is a remarkably adept man, though I do find his technique to be…wild. More in line with your normal style, in fact. Be sure that he is pressing you on your fundamentals. They are important.” He hesitated, touching the tip of his tongue to his teeth. “I know that you will, but I would also ask that you take care of Vessilia, Felix. Do not let her come to harm…and do not break her heart.”

Felix blinked at the man. The words had all the pieces of a threat, but lacked any heat. Instead they were a cold promise. “I don’t intend to.”

Darius only bowed, fully at the waist. “That is all I can ask.”

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